Head First PMP

Jennifer Greene, has spent the past 15 years or so building software for many different kinds of companies. She's worked for small start-ups and some huge companies along the way. She's built software test teams and helped lots of companies diagnose and deal with habitual process problems so that they could build better software. Since her start in software test and process definition, she's branched out into development management and project management. She's currently managing a big development team for a global media company and she's managed just about every aspect of software development through her career. Jennifer founded Stellman & Greene Consulting with Andrew Stellman in 2003, initially to serve the scientific and academic community. They have worked in a wide range of industries including finance, telecommunications, media, non-profit, entertainment, natural language processing, science and academia. They do speaking engagements, provide training on development practices, manage teams, and build software. Together, they've written two highly acclaimed books on project management (Head First PMP and Applied Software Project Management), Head First C#, and most recently just finished up Beautiful Teams.

Andrew Stellman, despite being raised a New Yorker, has lived in Pittsburgh twice. The first time was when he graduated from Carnegie Mellon's School of Computer Science, and then again when he and Jenny were starting their consulting business and writing their first project management book for O'Reilly. When he moved back to his hometown, his first job after college was as a programmer at EMI-Capitol Records--which actually made sense, since he went to LaGuardia High School of Music and Art and the Performing Arts to study cello and jazz bass guitar. He and Jenny first worked together at that same financial software company, where he was managing a team of programmers. He's since managed various teams of software engineers, requirements analysts, and led process improvement efforts. Andrew keeps himself busy eating an enormous amount of string cheese and Middle Eastern desserts, playing music (but video games even more), studying taiji and aikido, having a girlfriend named Lisa, and owing a pomeranian.

Chapter 1 Introduction: Why get certified?
Do these problems seem familiar?
Projects don’t have to be this way
Your problems...already solved
What you need to be a good project manager
Understand your company’s big picture
Your project has value
Portfolios, programs, and projects have a lot in common
Portfolios, programs, and projects all use charters
What a project IS...
... and what a project is NOT
A day in the life of a project manager
How project managers run great projects
Project management offices help you do a good job, every time
Good leadership helps the team work together
Project teams are made of people
Operations management handles the processes that make your company tick
A PMP certification is more than just passing a test
Meet a real-life PMP-certified project manager
Chapter 2 Organizations, constraints, and projects: In good company
A day in Kate’s life
Kate wants a new job
There are different types of organizations
Kate takes a new job
Stakeholders are impacted by your project
More types of stakeholders
Your project team has lots of roles too
Back to Kate’s maintenance nightmare
Managing project constraints
You can’t manage your project in a vacuum
Kate’s project needs to follow company processes
Kate makes some changes...
... and her project is a success!
Chapter 3 The Process Framework: It all fits together
Cooking up a project
Projects are like recipes
If your project’s really big, you can manage it in phases
Phases can also overlap
Break it down
Anatomy of a process
Combine processes to complete your project
Knowledge areas organize the processes
The benefits of successful project management
Exam Answers
Chapter 4 Project Integration Management: Getting the job done
Time to book a trip
The teachers are thrilled...for now
These clients are definitely not satisfied
The day-to-day work of a project manager
The six Integration Management processes
Start your project with the Initiating processes
Integration Management and the process groups
The Develop Project Charter process
Make the case for your project
Use expert judgment and facilitation techniques to write your project charter
A closer look at the project charter
Two things you’ll see over and over and over...
Plan your project!
The Project Management plan lets you plan ahead for problems
A quick look at all those subsidiary plans
Question Clinic: The “just-the-facts-ma’am” question
The Direct and Manage Project Work process
The project team creates deliverables
Executing the project includes repairing defects
Eventually, things WILL go wrong...
Sometimes you need to change your plans
Look for changes and deal with them
Make only the changes that are right for your project
Changes, defects, and corrections
Decide your changes in change control meetings
How the processes interact with one another
Control your changes; use change control
Preventing or correcting problems
Finish the work, close the project
You don’t have to go home, but you can’t stay here
So why INTEGRATION Management?
Integration Management kept your project on track, and the teachers satisfied
Chapter 5 Scope Management: Doing the right stuff
Out of the frying pan...
... and right back into the fire
Cubicle conversation
It looks like we have a scope problem
You’ve got to know what (and how) you will build before you build it
The power of Scope Management
The six Scope Management processes
Plan your scoping processes
Now you’ve got a roadmap for managing scope
Cubicle conversation
Collect requirements for your project
Talk to your stakeholders
Make decisions about requirements
Help your team to get creative
Use a questionnaire to get requirements from a bigger group of people
Observation can help you see things from a different point of view
A prototype shows users what your product will be like
Now you’re ready to write a requirements document
Define the scope of the project
How do you define the scope?
The project scope statement tells you what you have to do
Question Clinic: The “which-is-BEST” question
Create the work breakdown structure
The inputs for the WBS come from other processes
Breaking down the work
Break it down by project or phase
Decompose deliverables into work packages
Inside the work package
The project scope baseline is a snapshot of the plan
The outputs of the Create WBS process
Cubicle conversation
Why scope changes
The Control Scope process
Anatomy of a change
A closer look at the change control system
Just one Control Scope tool/technique
Make sure the team delivered the right product
The stakeholders decide when the project is done
Is the project ready to go?
The project is ready to ship!
Chapter 6 Time management: Getting it done on time
Reality sets in for the happy couple
Meet the wedding planner
Time management helps with aggressive timelines
Plan your scheduling processes
Now you know how you’ll track your schedule
Use the Define Activities process to break down the work
Tools and techniques for Define Activities
Rolling wave planning lets you plan as you go
Define activities outputs
The Sequence Activities process puts everything in order
Diagram the relationship between activities
Network diagrams put your tasks in perspective
Dependencies help you sequence your activities
Leads and lags add time between activities
Create the network diagram
Rob and Rebecca have resource problems
What you need to estimate resources
Estimating the resources
Figuring out how long the project will take
Estimation tools and techniques
Create the duration estimate
Back to the wedding
Bringing it all together
Question Clinic: The “which-comes-next” question
One thing leads to another
Use the critical path method to avoid big problems
How to find the critical path
Finding the float for any activity
Float tells you how much extra time you have
Figure out the early start and early finish
Figure out the latest possible start and finish
Add early and late durations to your diagrams
Take a backward pass to find late start and finish
Let’s take some time out to walk through this!
Crash the schedule
Fast-tracking the project
Modeling techniques
Other Develop Schedule tools and techniques
Outputs of Develop Schedule
Influence the factors that cause change
Control Schedule inputs and outputs
What Control Schedule updates
Measuring and reporting performance
Control Schedule tools and techniques
Another satisfied customer!
Chapter 7 Cost Management: Watching the bottom line
Time to expand the Head First Lounge
The guys go overboard
Lounge conversation
Introducing the Cost Management processes
Plan how you’ll estimate, track, and control your costs
Now you’ve got a consistent way to manage costs
What Alice needs before she can estimate costs
Other tools and techniques used in Estimate Costs
Let’s talk numbers
Now Alice knows how much the Lounge will cost
Lounge conversation
The Determine Budget process
What you need to build your budget
Determine budget: how to build a budget
Question Clinic: The red herring
The Control Costs process is a lot like schedule control
A few new tools and techniques
Look at the schedule to figure out your budget
How to calculate planned value
Earned value tells you how you’re doing
How to calculate earned value
Put yourself in someone else’s shoes
Is your project behind or ahead of schedule?
Are you over budget?
The earned value management formulas
Interpret CPI and SPI numbers to gauge your project
Forecast what your project will look like when it’s done
Meanwhile, back in the Lounge
Once you’ve got an estimate, you can calculate a variance!
Finding missing information
Keep your project on track with TCPI
A high TCPI means a tight budget
Party time!
Chapter 8 Quality Management: Getting it right
What is quality?
You need more than just tests to figure out quality
Once you know what the product is supposed to do, it’s easy to tell which tests pass and which fail
Quality up close
Quality vs. grade
“An ounce of prevention...”
Plan Quality is how you prevent defects
How to plan for quality
The Quality Management plan gives you what you need to manage quality
Inspect your deliverables
Use the planning outputs for Control Quality
The seven basic tools of quality
Pareto charts, flowcharts, and histograms
Checksheets and scatter diagrams
More quality control tools
Question Clinic: The “which-one” question
Quality control means finding and correcting defects
Trouble at the Black Box 3000TM factory
Introducing Quality Assurance
A closer look at some tools and techniques
More ideas behind quality assurance
The Black Box 3000TM makes record profits!
Exam Answers
Chapter 9 Human Resource Management: Getting the team together
Mike needs a new team
Cubicle conversation
Get your team together and keep them moving
Figure out who you need on your team
The Staffing Management plan
Get the team together
Cubicle conversation
Develop your project team
Develop the team with your management skills
Your interpersonal skills can make a big difference for your team
Lead the team with your management skills
Motivate your team
Stages of team development
How’s the team doing?
Cubicle conversation
Managing your team means solving problems
Conflict management up close
How to resolve a conflict
The Cows Gone Wild IV team ROCKS!
Question Clinic: The “have-a-meeting” question
Chapter 10 Communications management: Getting the word out
Party at the Head First Lounge!
But something’s not right
Anatomy of communication
Get a handle on communication
Tell everyone what’s going on
Get the message?
More Manage Communications tools
Let everyone know how the project’s going
Take a close look at the work being done
Now you can get the word out
People aren’t talking!
Count the channels of communication
It’s party time!
Question Clinic: The calculation question
Chapter 11 Project Risk Management: Planning for the unknown
What’s a risk?
How you deal with risk
Plan Risk Management
Use a risk breakdown structure to categorize risks
Anatomy of a risk
What could happen to your project?
Information-gathering techniques for Identify Risks
More Identify Risks techniques
Where to look for risks
Now put it in the risk register
Rank your risks
Examine each risk in the register
Qualitative vs. quantitative analysis
Perform Quantitative Risk Analysis
First gather the data...
... then analyze it
Calculate the expected monetary value of your risks
Decision tree analysis uses EMV to help you make choices
Update the risk register based on your quantitative analysis results
How do you respond to a risk?
It isn’t always so bad
Response planning can even find more risks
Add risk responses to the register
You can’t plan for every risk at the start of the project
Control Risks is another change control process
How to control your risks
More control risk tools and techniques
Question Clinic: The “which-is-NOT” question
Chapter 12 Procurement Management: Getting some help
Victim of her own success
Calling in the cavalry
Ask the legal expert
Anatomy of an agreement
Start with a plan for the whole project
The decision is made
Types of contractual agreements
More about contracts
Figure out how you’ll sort out potential sellers
Get in touch with potential sellers
Pick a partner
Two months later...
Keep an eye on the contract
Stay on top of the seller
Close the contract when the work is done
Kate closes the contract
Question Clinic: BYO questions
Exam Questions
Exam
Chapter 13 Stakeholder Management: Keeping everyone engaged
Party at the Head First Lounge (again)!
Not everybody is thrilled
Understanding your stakeholders
Find out who your stakeholders are
Stakeholder analysis up close
How engaged are your stakeholders?
Managing stakeholder engagement means clearing up misunderstandings
Control your stakeholders’ engagement
Now you can tell when you need to change the way you deal with stakeholders
It’s party time!
Exam Questions
Exam
Chapter 14 Professional Responsibility: Making good choices
Doing the right thing
Keep the cash?
Fly business class?
New software
Shortcuts
A good price or a clean river?
We’re not all angels
Exam Questions
Exam
Chapter 15 A Little Last-Minute Review: Check your knowledge
A long-term relationship for your brain
Here’s how to do this next section
Great job! It looks like you’re almost ready
Chapter 16 Practice Makes Perfect: Practice PMP exam
Before you look at the answers...